MICHELLE WILLARD, Post Staff Writer
Posted: Friday, January 8, 2010 2:31 pm

Local cyclists are facing an ever-increasing number of hazards when they leave the Greenway and hit the highway.

Andy Mitchell was on his way home from work earlier this week when a car ran a red light striking his bike and sending him flying.

The rural letter carrier was leaving his job at the U.S. Post Office Tuesday night and headed back to his home in Indian Hills subdivision when he stopped his bike at the red light by Kroger’s waiting to turn onto South Church Street.

“The light turns green and you know the drill,” he explained. “I push off, click in, start to pedal, which has to take, what, at least 5 seconds after I saw the green. And then a car on 231 runs through the red light and hits me.”

Mitchell counts himself as lucky because the car hit the front fork of his bike and not his body.

“It hit me on the left, but I actually somersaulted mid-air and landed on the pavement on my right side. Didn't hit my head or anything, but man is that pavement hard at 25 degrees,” he said.

The accident left him with a bruised bone in his right leg and on crutches.

“I'm just glad to still be kickin’ at all,” he said.

Mitchell’s accident is just the type the Rutherford County Public Safety Committee wants to prevent with the creation of an ad-hoc committee to study bicycle safety.

The committee will study current bike laws in the state and recommend ways to improve safety for cyclists on county roadways.

“With the growing number of people in the county and hopefully a growing number who want to exercise, we could get that information together,” Commissioner Ron Williams said when suggesting the subcommittee to the county’s Public Safety Committee on Dec. 28.

Murfreesboro Bike Club Advocacy Chair Sarah Lovett addressed the committee and brought up some safety issues that local cyclists face when riding on Rutherford County roads.

“I’ve had beer bottles thrown at me and water bottles thrown at me. I’ve had ugly things yelled at me on the road. And that’s really against the law,” she said.

Lovett outlined some changes the city of Murfreesboro is making to local roads to make them safer for cyclists, like putting up “Share the Road” signs and adding bike lanes to new roads. She suggested the county address the same issues when developing its Comprehensive Land Use plan.

“If we do nothing more than to get some signs up and address some more favorable roads or less favorable roads, it could make a difference,” Williams said.

Safer roads for cyclists could encourage more people to take up the activity and make the county healthier in the process, Lovett said.

To make the roads safer, Lovett also suggested developing an education plan for cyclists and motorists alike to increase safety and perhaps prevent accidents like Mitchell’s, which was the second time he’s been hit by a car on his bike.

In 2007, he was riding on Barfield-Crescent Road when an SUV turned into the Food Lion and into him.

“They never saw me, turned right into my path and I bounced off the front of the vehicle,” he said, adding he was just bruised and not broken by the accident. “I'm a lucky and very blessed guy.”

Michelle Willard can be contacted at 615-869-0816 or mwillard@murfreesboropost.com.